Call it a dilemma, quandary, or Catch-22 – just pray the aging Democratic party doesn’t pull a muscle trying to argue that it is in anything other than an unenviable position.
Eighty-eight-year-old Eleanor Holmes Norton, Washington, D.C.’s longtime representative in Congress, has repeatedly stated that she will seek yet another term in office. The only trouble is that every time she does, her staff scrambles to assure the world that isn’t actually the case.
One must sympathize with their impulse. Norton has been absent from her day job even as the district dominates national headlines, and struggled through what few public appearances she’s made. The situation is dire enough that Norton’s self-described “dear friend” Donna Brazile took to The Washington Post to urge her to step aside.
“There are a lot of talented Democrats in D.C.,” wrote Brazile. “If Norton decides not to run for reelection, there will be a very competitive race for the seat.”
And besides, the stakes are low should Norton ride off into the sunset, given the fact that Democrats have a stranglehold on her seat.
But Norton is no outlier. Across the country, the party is staring down the barrel of a much more difficult choice between aged incompetence and unpopular extremism.
The divide between these two factions – a stale establishment and radical insurgency – was only deepened by Joe Biden’s failed presidency, and the ongoing debate over who ought to bear the blame for it. On the one hand, Biden, then 78-year-old, was the most conservative viable Democrat to run in 2020. On the other, he governed far to the left of where he campaigned; and Vice President Kamala Harris lost her bid to succeed him in large part thanks to the unpopular, progressive positions she staked out in 2020.
The story of how the party came to be stuck between a rock and a hard place begins, ironically enough, begins with the presidential campaign of geriatric socialist Bernie Sanders.
In 2016, Sanders’s overperformance in the Democratic primary, Hillary Clinton’s defeat in the general election, and Donald Trump’s presidency all inspired a leftward shift – or sprint – within the party. And in the years since, progressives such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Chicago’s Brandon Johnson, and New York City’s Zohran Mamdani have risen to prominence.
After Mamdani defeated establishment scion Andrew Cuomo in the Democrats’ Big Apple mayoral primary, the left turned the pressure up on party leadership to endorse Mamdani, who will face off against Cuomo once again come November.
Axios recently reported that House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) is facing a “revolt” over his failure to throw his weight behind the upstart.
The Democratic Party is plagued by two afflictions exemplified by each of its competing cohorts. One need only watch a half-minute of a Jeffries or Chuck Schumer speech to agree with their critics’ evaluation of them. Their plodding, low-energy delivery – occasionally interrupted by shrill outbursts – underlines their lack of conviction. The pair represent a kind of empty suit, go-along-to-get-along politics that voters have emphatically rejected in both parties for the better part of a decade now.
And that’s to say nothing of the fact that this wing is quite literally dying out. Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-VA) passed away in May after beating out Ocasio-Cortez to serve as the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee just a few months prior. He was the eighth federal legislator to expire in office since November 2022; all eight were Democrats.
Biden is long gone. Schumer is 74 years old. Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC), the 85-year-old who made Biden king back in 2020, finally left House leadership this year. He endorsed Cuomo in the NYC primary, but has since come around and endorsed Mamdani in the general. The symbolism isn’t all that difficult to wrap one’s head around.
But then again, there’s little evidence that the far-left can find its footing outside of insular enclaves. Sanders came the closest to building a national movement in his mold, but his grumpy, grandfatherly affect has always softened the blow of his policy agenda. No one else is a proven entity anywhere but in large, ideologically uniform cities.
And for good reason. While Democratic voters are making googly eyes at socialism, it’s still a dirty word with the rest of the electorate. Among the former group, it boasts a +36 percent net approval rating; among the latter, it stands at a dismal -18 percent, according to Gallup.
Biden already test-drove the radicals’ laissez-faire immigration policy, while Harris took their social policies for a spin. They both ended up in the dustbin of American history, at once national jokes and villains.
The grass, at least for the elderly Democrat party, may not be greener on the other side.
Category: Policy
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Is the Democratic party over the hill?
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Donald Trump vs the First Amendment
Charlie Kirk’s assassination was a tragedy. A young conservative voice was silenced by savagery, leaving behind grieving family, faithful friends and loyal supporters.
But something deeply troubling is happening in the aftermath. The Trump administration isn’t just mourning Kirk or pursuing his killer. They’re using his death to justify an unprecedented crackdown on free speech that should alarm every American.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that visa holders are being deported for “celebrating” Kirk’s killing. The State Department warned immigrants against “making light” of his death. An anonymous group called the Charlie Kirk Data Foundation is building a database of social media users who criticized Kirk or his politics. Stephen Miller promised to “identify, disrupt, dismantle, and destroy” what he calls “terrorist networks” – apparently meaning anyone who expressed the wrong opinion online about Kirk’s death. And Pam Bondi has vowed to go after those espousing “hate speech”.
Don’t mistake this for justice. It is pure opportunism.
MAGA supporters need to see the danger clearly. A government that can revoke visas and punish people for social media posts today will have no problem turning the same power on citizens tomorrow. The surveillance tools now aimed at so-called left-wing extremists can just as easily be aimed at conservative voices when political winds shift. The databases being filled with the names of Kirk’s critics can just as easily be filled with the names of Trump’s supporters once Democrats take power again.
The First Amendment was never meant to protect only comfortable or convenient speech. It was written to protect the difficult and divisive, the words that anger us, unsettle us, even repulse us. Freedom lives in that space. Once the government claims the power to decide which opinions are acceptable, freedom begins to die. What starts as punishment for enemies always ends as control over everyone.
Every authoritarian government follows the same pattern. First, they identify a sympathetic victim. Then they claim extraordinary measures are needed to protect society. Finally, those “temporary” powers become permanent and expand far beyond their original purpose. The Patriot Act was sold as necessary to fight terrorists after 9/11. Twenty-three years later, those surveillance powers are still being used against ordinary Americans. The same tools meant to catch foreign enemies now monitor parents at school board meetings and peaceful protesters.
Kirk’s assassination is becoming the Patriot Act for speech. A crackdown on so-called terrorist networks is the first step toward a crackdown on dissent itself.
Look closely at who’s being targeted. Not just people celebrating murder – though that’s deplorable – but anyone who “criticized” Kirk or “made light” of his death. The definitions keep expanding. What counts as “criticism”? Disagreeing with Kirk’s politics? Questioning his methods? Making a sarcastic comment about conservative media? Who decides what crosses the line from protected speech to deportable offense?
Anonymous groups are building lists of American citizens based on their social media activity. They openly state their goal is to “clear out Leftwing Radicals” from American institutions. What’s being sold as law enforcement is, in fact, political purging.
The infrastructure for mass censorship is already being built. The administration is reviewing 55 million visa holders for “violations.” They’re monitoring college campuses, tracking online activity, and encouraging citizens to report on each other. These systems don’t disappear when administrations change. They get inherited and expanded. The Democrat who defeats Trump’s successor will have access to every database, every surveillance tool, every legal precedent being established today.
Real patriots defend the Constitution when it is inconvenient. Especially when it is inconvenient. Supporting free speech for those you agree with is easy. Supporting it for those you despise is what separates America from authoritarian nations.
Trump supporters should ask themselves: Do you want the federal government deciding which opinions are acceptable? Do you trust future Democratic administrations with such powers? Do you want your children growing up in a country where citizens spy on one another’s posts? The answer should be a resounding no.
Charlie Kirk believed in conservative principles. Honor his memory by defending them. Limited government. Individual liberty. Constitutional rights that belong to all citizens, not just political allies. His assassination was devastating, and it calls for justice through lawful means. But using that tragedy to justify greater government control over speech betrays everything he stood for.
The First Amendment has survived wars, depressions, and deadly terrorist attacks. It must also survive Trump’s assault. Charlie Kirk’s legacy should not signal the death of free speech in America. It should stand as its defense, carried proudly by citizens who refuse to surrender their most sacred right. -
Where is America’s 9/11 spirit?
Stark was the contrast between the selfless heroism and unity of purpose on and in the aftermath of September 11, 2001, and the nation’s reaction to the events of September 10, 2025.
In abundantly obvious respects, the two days differed. Conservative activist Charlie Kirk, his wife, their two children, and the rest of his loved ones were the only immediate victims of his assassination on September 10.
In contrast, Osama bin Laden’s hell-bound errand boys murdered nearly 3,000 Americans, saddled thousands more with diseases that later claimed their lives, and altered New York City’s skyline forever on September 11. America went to war afterwards.
But the two tragedies, though they varied in scale, shared one key similarity that a disturbingly small proportion of the country has acknowledged: they both represented attacks on the very idea of the United States as a tolerant, pluralistic democracy whose citizens enjoy freedoms unknown to most of human history – including, and perhaps most importantly, the freedom to disagree.
Kirk traveled to college campuses to try to persuade young men and women to adopt his worldview. For that crime, a madman sentenced him to death.
The correct reaction to this horrifying act of vigilante injustice was modeled on the far-left by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who delivered a masterclass in how to honor his political opponents – and their shared country – in an admirably unqualified manner.
“I want to say a few words regarding the terrible murder yesterday of Charlie Kirk, someone who I strongly disagreed with on almost every issue, but who was clearly a very smart and effective communicator and organizer, and someone unafraid to get out into the world and engage the public,” began Sanders. “Freedom and democracy is not about political violence. It is not about assassinating public officials. It is not about trying to intimidate people who speak out on an issue. Political violence, in fact, is political cowardice. It means that you cannot convince people of the correctness of your ideas, and you have to impose them through force.”
There was no “But” in Sanders’s condemnation of Kirk’s assassination, no self-righteous enumeration of his countless – and doubtlessly vehement – disagreements with Kirk, and no attempt to put political points on the board. Only a sincere expression of condolences and articulation of unifying principles. All was as it should be.
Sadly, Sanders’s words were made all the more moving by their loneliness. To be sure, an overwhelming majority of public figures, including on the left, condemned Kirk’s murder. But far fewer reckoned with the gravity of what happened in Utah last Wednesday, or responded to it with the gravitas the crisis demands.
While the “rats” – vocal ghouls who celebrated the murder of an innocent countryman – are not a critical mass of Democratic voters, or activists, or even congressmen, that is not to excuse the behavior of some particularly shameful members of the party. Though they may not have popped any champagne after Kirk’s death, they betrayed their apathy toward it in other ways.
The day after Kirk fell, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) joined Mehdi Hasan for a session in which they – among other indignities – mocked the self-evident truth that Kirk believed in the power of civil debate. Reps. Dave Min (D-CA) and Eric Swalwell (D-CA), meanwhile, glibly attempted to make a political profit off of Kirk’s murder by misleading the public about the perpetrator.
“Now that the Charlie Kirk assassin has been identified as MAGA, I’m sure Donald Trump, Elon Musk and all the insane GOP politicians who called for retribution against the ‘RADICAL LEFT’ will now shift their focus to stopping the toxic violence of the RADICAL RIGHT,” mused Min.
“It doesn’t matter that Kirk’s killer was a straight white male. Or that he was from a Republican family that voted for Donald Trump. Violence has NEVER been the answer,” submitted Swalwell.
Let the reader understand: authorities have identified the alleged shooter as a man “deeply indoctrinated with leftist ideology” whose partner was transgender. Kirk was shot while discussing the phenomenon of transgender mass shooters.
While for understandable, if not entirely laudable reasons, some on the right have called for a figurative war effort in the wake of Kirk’s assassination. “Y’all caused this!” shouted Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) at her Democratic colleagues following a moment of silence for Kirk on the House floor.
It all amounts to a scathing self-critique of not the right or the left, but of a society so self-indulgent and siloed that hardly anyone inside of it can subordinate the interests of their faction after a national tragedy – not even for a week – to those of the wider country, or even to memorializing the man who died.
Twenty-four years ago, Americans came together to face a common enemy. Today, they’re coming together on opposing sides of a battlefield, tragically convinced that their enemies have lived next door all along. -
The ‘recklessness’ of Joe Biden, according to Kamala Harris
The Atlantic published the first excerpt of Kamala Harris’s expensive memoir “107 Days” this morning, leading with a lickspittle editor’s note from Jeffrey Goldberg. According to Goldberg, the Harris we read in this book is:
“blunt, knowing, fervent, occasionally profane, slyly funny. As you will see in the following excerpt – and throughout this newsworthy book – she no longer seems particularly interested in holding back.”
In this short excerpt we learn that Vice-President Harris repaired our supposedly broken relationship with France, mais oui, and also did a good job as “border czar.” She says so herself, and we have only her to thank. But the most newsworthy portion of the excerpt comes earlier, when she discusses Joe Biden’s unwillingness to drop out of the 2024 race.
“It’s Joe and Jill’s decision. We all said that, like a mantra, as if we’d all been hypnotized. Was it grace, or was it recklessness? In retrospect, I think it was recklessness. The stakes were simply too high. This wasn’t a choice that should have been left to an individual’s ego, an individual’s ambition. It should have been more than a personal decision.”
“Recklessness.” “Ego.” The remaining 12 loyalists in Bidenworld are going to be mad. Harris adds:
“Joe Biden was a smart guy with long experience and deep conviction, able to discharge the duties of president. On his worst day, he was more deeply knowledgeable, more capable of exercising judgment, and far more compassionate than Donald Trump on his best. But at 81, Joe got tired.”
Harris claims that she was more “loyal to my country” than she was to Joe Biden, but she held her tongue until the Party anointed her as successor and gave her free reign to completely botch her campaign against Trump. Anyone who read Fight, the excellent chronicle of the 2024 campaign that came out earlier this year, or even cursorily followed the narrative as it unfolded in real time, knows the contours of the story. Harris, handled an impossible task, managed to make a series of disastrous decisions, emboldened by her senior campaign staff imported from Barack Obama loyalists, who were both out of touch with reality and also didn’t like Harris much.
I don’t see any of that “bluntness” in this excerpt, which is also not slyly funny or occasionally profane. Unlike Fight, which was no Lost Illusions but still read like it had been written by actual humans with actual personalities, this excerpt of 107 Days reads very “as told to,” either to Harris’s extremely well-paid ghostwriter or to an AI chatbot, or to a ghostwriter who uses an AI chatbot. It may be unapologetic, but it’s also unapologetic sludge.
Harris, as the first female vice president, is an important historical figure, and she’s hardly the demon as painted by her opponents on the right. She’s also no great shakes. What we see in the memoir excerpt is what we saw of her in real life: marginal competence, extreme self-absorption, performative liberalism and laugh lines that fall dead to everyone but the most extreme paid loyalists. Let’s also keep in mind that it’s been less than a year since she’s lost, and even less time than that since she left office. This is a rehabilitation tour planned from the outset, and the whole thing feels fake, silly and manipulative.
Now we can sit back and wait for the recrimination cycle that may or may not come. There may be some ruffled feathers in Bidenworld. And Harris is, like it or not, going to be on our screens and in our feeds a lot in the next month or so. But there might also be less controversy than hoped for by people who love political gossip. Jeffrey Goldberg, invoking “my friend Kamala” just like Obama used to, may care about what’s in 107 Days, but the rest of the world has moved along.
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The truth about the trans school shooter
True, one of the earliest school shooters, Brenda Spencer, who shot up a playground in San Diego in 1979, was a girl – providing the peg for the Boomtown Rats’ hit “I Don’t Like Mondays.” But that was a long time ago. Since then, American mass shooters have been overwhelmingly male. One would expect, then, that when the culprit in an attack on young children is a woman, that anomaly would merit journalistic remark. After all, following these baffling bursts of nihilistic animosity, there’s little enough to say. Yet after “Robin” Westman opened fire on kids at mass in a Catholic school in Minneapolis in late August, segments of the media were conspicuously incurious about how “she” came to be consumed by such commonly masculine rage.
This grotesque incident was, as usual, pointless – and as a longtime commentator on such shootings, I despair there are so few, if any, productive observations to advance. While still exhibiting the classic, seemingly antithetical traits of grandiosity and self-loathing, this killer was, to me, uniquely repulsive. Craving distraction, then, I’ve idly kept track of which media outlets have perversely and pugnaciously referred to Robin (né Robert) Westman as female.
Naturally, for the New York Times the transgender killer is “she” or “Ms. Westman.” The BBC has also followed its guidelines to “generally use the term and pronoun preferred by the person in question” – even if the “person in question” committed suicide on site and is no longer in a position to have preferences of any kind.
When Senator Amy Klobuchar bewailed that “this horrific offender… that he… it was all-purpose hate, right?” and called Westman “a madman,” the interviewer from America’s National Public Radio appended: “And just a point of clarification, Senator Klobuchar referenced the shooter as ‘he’. Although police have identified a suspect, it’s still unclear at this time what that person’s gender is or how they identify.” Yet the shooter having been born male had already been retrieved from the public record. The sheep-in-conservative-clothing commentator on the PBS Newshour, David Brooks, repeatedly referred to Westman as female – no big surprise. But when a Wall Street Journal editorial also reported Westman had “changed her name from Robert,” my jaw dropped. Even Fox News reported the killer “had their name legally changed.” (All italics mine.) I’ve begrudging regard for ABC’s militant neutrality. In fastidiously citing “a person,” “Westman” with no title, “the shooter” and “the suspect,” the network boycotted pronouns altogether. That takes semantic discipline. But the right-of-center New York Post’s flat-out “he,” “him” and “gunman” is more courageous, not to mention more factually informative. At long last, the Daily Telegraph in London dared to identify Westman as male – though for years it referred even to preposterous, manipulative fake-female criminals such as “Isla” Bryson as “she.”
The trans cult attracts the insecure, the lost and ungrounded; the unstable, disturbed and, yes, outright deranged
For journalists to take a trans-mollycoddling stand in the pronoun wars isn’t merely to default to niceness. Misidentifying the biological sex of figures in news stories is an implicit declaration of support for an incoherent, unhinged ideology. This grammatical loyalty to progressive dogma apparently trumps journalistic integrity – the obligation to report the truth – and even decency. Chronicling the Annunciation Catholic Church and School shooting, the New York Times and the BBC are pandering to the tender feelings of someone who’s 1) a would-be mass murderer (the successful kind, by a rather arbitrary definition, kills four or more); 2) insane; and 3) dead. We alive people resent once-reputable news outlets choosing the occasion of two murdered children and at least 18 seriously injured people to propagandize and yet again defy biological reality.
Media kowtowing to trans orthodoxy alienates their mainstream audience. Incorrect pronouns drive news consumers nuts. Alluding to a burly guy in a pink wig with a five o’clock shadow as “she” makes journalists seem like fools and readers and viewers feel mocked. Even the wussy middle course of calling trans people “they” leads to grammatical confusion. Also late last month, the Telegraph reported that another (male) transgender killer, “Joanna” Rowland-Stuart, “stabbed their partner to death with a samurai sword.” The following para refers to Joanna’s attack in “their Brighton home.” Does that mean the couple’s home, or only Joanna’s?
In that case, the court has deemed the killer Joanna “unfit to plead,” meaning he’s bonkers. Is a pattern developing? Despite multiple cases of trans murderers whose sanity was dubious, I’d not claim, as some conservative pundits do, that trans people are grossly overrepresented in the depressingly long roster of American mass murderers. Yet people who are mentally ill in other respects are consistently the most susceptible to deciding they were “born in the wrong body.” The trans cult attracts the insecure, the lost and ungrounded; the unstable, disturbed and, yes, outright deranged.
We’ve turned confusion about which sex you are into a reasonable, dare I say normal, source of distress that demands redress, not by curing a delusion but encouraging it. Declaring you’re trans is a moment of self-discovery that we celebrate for its “authenticity” and “bravery.” In the olden days of Psycho, a man wearing women’s clothing sent an ominous signal that there’s something off about them.
Yet Westman’s transgenderism was so socially acceptable that it functioned as disguise – cloaking a manic mishmash of malice toward Jews, children, blacks, Hispanics, Christians, Donald Trump, doubtless everyone else and, not to forget, himself. Rather than signal there’s something wrong here, Westman’s dressing as a woman actually camouflaged the warning signs that the young man was out of his tiny mind. The seminal mistake in the progression of this demented transgender movement was no longer recognizing gender dysphoria as a mental disorder.
This article was originally published in The Spectator’s September 15 2025 World edition.
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Nationalizing America will cost us dearly
“I have the right to do anything I want to do,” Donald Trump told reporters in the White House cabinet room last month. “I’m the President of the United States.”
Other branches of the federal government might disagree, but their representatives are strangely mute. “What Trump wants, Trump gets” is the motto that has defined the first eight months of the President’s second term. The overhaul of global trade? Sorted with an executive order and a pen. Poor job numbers? Fire the messenger, hire your own. Feeling the acute absence of a ballroom? Take “a little walk” on top of your White House, look out at your vast kingdom, and decide where the marble floor and golden beams will go.
But domination of the federal government is simply not enough. This President has now set his sights on America’s real power engine: the private sector. And he doesn’t just want business to bend to his will. He wants a stake.
This President has now set his sights on America’s real power engine: the private sector
His first dabblings in acquired ownership have been met with very little resistance. “Intel is excited to welcome the United States of America as a shareholder,” the company said in its buoyant press release, after agreeing to hand over 10 percent of the company to the government in exchange for $8.9 billion in grants. The California-based manufacturer has gratefully received its 30 pieces of silver to solve several problems: not just the company’s financial issues, but an increasingly damaged public image, driven by Trump’s repeated criticisms of its chief executive Lip-Bu Tan and his “highly conflicted” connections to Chinese companies.
This Judas-style betrayal of business norms has made investors nervous about what comes next, and not just for the chip manufacturing company. The watering down of shareholder rights to get this deal over the line is worrisome enough, but the quick and casual manner in which the US government took its stake in Intel is what’s really garnered attention. “That was easy,” jests one Wall Street long-timer. Now everyone wants to know: who’s next?
Howard Lutnick has some ideas. Speaking last month on CNBC, the Commerce Secretary argued that defense companies such as Lockheed Martin are an “arm of the US government” – and ideal candidates for the government’s new equity search. The idea is picking up some sympathetic support, not least because some of these companies are almost completely funded by the US government already.
As is so often the case with Trump and his policies, there is a good point to be teased out around the drama and upheaval of norms. While some cry “dictatorship,” Intel seems rather enthusiastic about this new joint venture with the Swamp. It is a rare moment of transparency, one that gives Americans a glimpse into just how entwined the state and big business are: the former frequently propping up the latter, protecting major corporations from facing the consequences of failure in a market economy.
Indeed, the links between government money and big American corporations are inextricable. What is often described as a free market or a distinct separation of the state from the private sector is, in reality, crony capitalism on blatant display: billions of dollars transfer every year from the taxpayer to the country’s biggest healthcare provider, UnitedHealthcare, to cover both Medicare and Medicaid. Exxon Mobil benefits from receiving billions of its own, in the form of federal subsidies and loans.
Yet the extreme makeover of the Republican party – especially on business policy – means that rather than taking on cronyism and putting an end to taxpayer funds picking winners and losers, the second Trump administration is far more interested in how it can skim off the success and the profits of America’s biggest players, in how it can make government look like a “winner.”
Dreams of seizing the means of production are usually confined to one end of the political spectrum – the same end that likes to slip in talk of “manifestos” and workers of the world uniting. Not even New York’s Zohran Mamdani – the loud and proud socialist who won the Democratic nomination in the city’s mayoral race this summer – has yet felt so emboldened as to call for these kinds of business interventions. He’ll find it much easier to do so if Trump leads the way. It’s an uncomfortable overlap that neither the President nor the soon-to-be Mayor want to admit, but their shared love for economic populism explains why both men were able to move the numbers in their favor across the five boroughs in their most recent respective elections.
But is America ready for some real nationalization? Markets are still jittery, as they navigate the strong dose of protectionism Trump administered when he announced a 10 percent universal tariff on goods coming into the US. While the federal government does have a record of acquiring businesses, the Intel deal looks a lot more like the arrangements made in far more interventionist and often stagnant economies. The exception might be China, where the Chinese Communist party has at least some stake in the majority of large companies in the country. Is this really the model Trump wants to emulate?
Regardless, his plans may have to wait, as some parts of the government are not ready to settle for Trump’s takeover of the public sector just yet. The legality of Trump’s tariffs is now likely to be determined by the Supreme Court, while Democrats gear up for another spending battle on Capitol Hill.
It seems Trump will have enough to keep him busy within government before he seriously considers expanding his reach into the private sector.
This article was originally published in The Spectator’s September 15, 2025 World edition.
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The Senator from Virginia vs. the Declaration of Independence
At a Senate confirmation hearing Wednesday, Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia – Hillary Clinton’s 2016 running mate – decided to pick a fight not with the nominee before him so much with the American founding itself. In a remarkable four-minute speech, clips of which went viral, Kaine challenged the very idea of natural rights – that is, the belief that human beings possess fundamental freedoms simply by virtue of being human, not because government chooses to grant them.
His lecture was provoked by a seemingly uncontroversial statement. Riley Barnes, nominated as Assistant Secretary of State, quoted his presumptive future boss in his opening remarks: “We are a nation founded on a powerful principle, and that powerful principle is that all men are created equal, because our rights come from God our Creator – not from our laws, not from our governments.” He warned that when rights are untethered from that principle, “they can be easily manipulated by authoritarians and bad actors.”
As most American schoolchildren would recognize, this statement is taken nearly verbatim from the Declaration of Independence, which affirms that “all men are created equal” and “endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights.” For nearly 250 years, this idea has been America’s mission statement. Yet Kaine reacted with indignation, calling the notion “extremely troubling” and insisting it should make Americans “very, very nervous.”
Kaine centered his argument on likening the principles in the Declaration to Iran’s theocracy: “The notion that rights don’t come from laws and don’t come from the government, but come from the Creator – that’s what the Iranian government believes.” The comparison is absurd. The Islamic Republic of Iran has never positioned itself as a champion of natural rights. Its regime is built on repression, not liberty, and its Supreme Leader has openly sneered at human rights as a Western pretense. To liken Jefferson and Madison to clerical dictators in Tehran is simply dishonest.
And dishonesty, not ignorance, seems to be the basis for Kaine’s statements. He is an Ivy League graduate and a former governor of Virginia – the home state of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and George Washington. He knows perfectly well what the Declaration says and what the Founders believed. If he pretends otherwise, it is because he wants to send a message.
That message became clearer as Kaine continued to protest that attributing rights to God would somehow “demean” government and law. “I would never try to demean the law,” he said. In other words: How dare anyone suggest that politicians are beneath God? Despite describing himself as a “devout” Catholic, Kaine is comfortable diminishing the divine but not the authority of lawmakers like himself.
Although Kaine claims that appealing to natural rights is something that just arose “suddenly, after 250 years,” in fact, it is the foundation of the American tradition. The Founders insisted that government was subordinate to natural rights, not the other way around Kaine warns that divine endowments are theocratic, when in reality they are the only safeguard against despotism. Without rights anchored in something higher than law, there is nothing to stop law from becoming mere power. Kaine’s argument is not only incorrect, it is dangerous.
Bishop Robert Barron, responding to Kaine’s remarks on social media, explained: “If government creates our rights, then government can take them away.” That was exactly the tyranny the Declaration was written to resist. And one need not be religious to see the danger. Secular thinkers have long defended natural rights on philosophical grounds. The point is not that every American must invoke God, but that human dignity does not hinge on the state’s permission. Yet Kaine will not even concede that. He suggests instead that rights exist only because government decrees them – a logic fit for authoritarians, not heirs of Jefferson.
Why would Kaine want to dismantle this philosophy? Because for today’s Democratic Party, natural rights are inconvenient. They are limits on government power, barriers that cannot be legislated away. Many progressives would prefer rights to be malleable—redefined, expanded, or rescinded at will, according to the agenda of the moment. Again and again, the left reveals it values power over principle.
Kaine’s remarks were not a stray gaffe. It was a glimpse of where his party is heading. The left’s constant attempts to delegitimize the Founding Fathers themselves, combined with the bogeyman of a supposed modern Christian nationalist movement, has become a tool to alienate Americans from the ideas that made the republic possible.
Without the concept of natural rights, individuals don’t have rights at all – only benefits and favors granted and withdrawn by the politicians in power. For politicians who want to be the source of your freedoms, God is a rival, our founding principles are obstacles, and natural rights in particular threaten to undermine their authority. In the hearing, Kaine said the quiet part out loud: In his vision, your rights belong to him and his party. And they can take them back whenever they please.
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Why America needs the Department of War
Six months into President Trump’s second administration and there is perhaps no other government department that has been subject to more controversies than the Department of Defense. Brouhahas have ranged from the in-fact favorable (see the banning of affirmative action) to the admittedly concerning (see significant leaks of sensitive information). And now Trump has pulled the pin on possibly his most powerful grenade so far – and rolled it Pete Hegseth’s way. But after the smoke clears from this particular explosion, there is a real opportunity for the department to be born again, fighting fit, from the debris.
President Trump has signed an executive order returning the Department of Defense to its original moniker, the Department of War. In his inimitable style, Trump proclaimed, “We went woke and changed to the Department of Defense. This is something we thought long and hard about it. We won World War One, World War Two, everything before that and in between… we’re going to change it to the Department of war, it’s a much more appropriate name.” This will take an act of Congress, but Republican support seems forthcoming.
The reactions from the president’s detractors have been outlandish, particularly on social media. Critics have labeled the decision “a reckless and outdated stunt,” “performative” and a waste of taxpayer dollars. Opponents claim it is hypocritical for Trump to say he’s pro-peace while promoting this change. They even argue that it reveals the administration to be “warmongering neocons.” Some have suggested that this is merely a precursor for imposition of martial law and a total descent into fascism.
In reality, it is none of these. The title of the Department of War is more descriptive, honors our history, reduces rhetorical confusion and better fits the geopolitical moment.
The War Department was the second executive branch department created by Congress, being established on August 7, 1789. Until the Navy Department was created nearly a decade later, the War Department held all military portfolios in the US government. America fought the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Civil War, the Spanish-American War and both World Wars under this arrangement, building our nation into the world-spanning colossus that it is today. The War Department would remain a staple of American government until 1949, when the various martial branches were consolidated under the auspices of the Department of Defense. Returning to the original name and portfolio would honor our nation’s military history in the lead-up to our nation’s 250th anniversary next year.
It would also better suit the actual purpose of the department and reduce confusion and overlap. The Department of Homeland Security, established in the wake of 9/11, carries out many of the functions of territorial defense of the nation. It polices our borders, enforces immigration and criminal law, and patrols the waters of our near-abroad, safeguarding our coasts. As such, the Defense Department is not engaged primarily in homeland defense; it fights wars and carries out missions everywhere on the planet and will likely do the same in the space domain this century. Warfighting is indeed what the military is for. We should not shy away from that reality; our adversaries surely do not.
And that points to the most useful aspect of this change: as a threat to our enemies. America faces the gravest geopolitical situation that we have seen since at least 1991, if not 1945. Our foes are arrayed against the US-led world order and have been threatening and attacking their neighbors in a quest to undermine our primacy and the very idea of national sovereignty. China, Russia, Iran and their satrapies are becoming more closely intertwined and dangerous with every passing day. They make no secret of their goal: overturning the international system and replacing it with something more amenable to their belligerent, expansionist desires.
This antagonism must not be ignored. It must be confronted head-on. This requires a change in mindset. No longer are we in the stable, post-Cold War era, where non-state actors posed the largest challenge to America. We are in the rough-and-tumble age of great-power rivalry. Our adversaries understand this. It is time we do as well. Returning the Defense Department to its original title shows that we are recognizing the new reality. -
After Rosie O’Donnell, the Americans Trump should strip of citizenship
As he often does when things get a little hot in the kitchen, President Trump went after Rosie O’Donnell again yesterday. “We are giving serious thought to taking away Rosie O’Donnell’s Citizenship,” he wrote on Truth Social. O’Donnell, he said, is “not a Great American,” layering that on top of what he said in July, that Rosie is “not in the best interests of our great country.”
I don’t think anyone other than her closest associates would argue that Rosie O’Donnell is “Great,” but she is, technically, an “American.” If the Trump Administration wants to revoke citizenship for every mediocre celebrity who criticizes the President, well, then, Hollywood is going to have to do some fast outsourcing. Let’s think about who else is on the chopping block.
Ellen DeGeneres
Once American’s first lesbian sitcom darling, then the dancing queen of daytime TV, Ellen has fallen from court favor under a cloud of employee mistreatment allegations. After pitching a huff over Trump’s re-election, she’s moved to the United Kingdom, where she’s slowly morphing into Farmer Hoggett from Babe. She and her wife, former Arrested Development star Portia DeRossi, live in a modest $18 million farmhouse, where she’s entered into a “planning clash” with her neighbors after committing a “technical breach” over some Roman remains. Ellen is the first person to simultaneously run afoul of the American empire and the Roman Empire, and as such she must be on Trump’s naughty list. We won’t see the likes of her stateside again.
Eva Longoria
The Desperate Housewives star and her husband, multimillionaire media executive José Baston, fled the United States after Trump won, dividing their time between their hovels in Spain and Mexico. “I’m privileged. I get to escape and go somewhere. Most Americans aren’t so lucky,” she told Marie Claire last fall. “They are going to be stuck in this dystopian country, and my anxiety and my sadness is for them.” Still, times were tough for Longoria, who was so desperate to escape the MAGA jackboot that she sold her Beverly Hills estate for $19 million instead of the asking price of $22 million. No citizenship for you!
George Clooney
Rumors spread online in December that Clooney had fled the US because he “can’t take the red wave anymore,” though that doesn’t appear to be the case. He and his wife Amal, a human-rights lawyer and therefore a strong candidate for citizenship revocation, have a multimillion dollar mansion on the shores of Lake Como, and also appear to live in the UK, a backwards, repressive post-colonial state that is the ironic living choice for freedom-loving American liberals. He doesn’t seem to like it here anyway, so let’s yank the passport. Goodnight, George. And good luck.
Courtney Love
Apparently because she loves governments who arrest people because they don’t like their opinions, the former grunge icon announced last year that she’s applying for her UK passport. After all, she already lives there. “I’m finally getting my British citizenship in six months. I get to be a citizen. I’m applying, man! Can’t get rid of me!” Not a good American, Courtney Love. Very nasty person. She wants to be the girl with the most scones. We might have to look into taking away her citizenship.
Sharon Stone
In July of last year, Stone told the Daily Mail that she was “certainly considering a house in Italy. I think that’s an intelligent construct at this time. This is one of the first times in my life that I’ve actually seen anyone running for office on a platform of hate and oppression.” Who among us hasn’t considered a house in Italy? To rent. For a week. With extended family. As you well know, if you’re trying to flee “hate and oppression,” move to notoriously welcoming and tolerant ITALY.
Billie Eilish
Rumors flew after Trump was re-elected that Eilish was going to leave the country, but they turned out to not be true and she’s just kind of quietly going about her business. Citizenship revocation should still be on the table, though. She and her brother Phinneas can go live on a cloud.
Barack Obama
You know who isn’t saying they’re going to leave the country? The Obamas. America has been good to them. But if Trump really wants to go full circle in his political career, he can distract from whatever problems he’s having by reviving the “birther” slander. It’s not true. Of course it’s not true. But since when did what’s true mean what’s best for America?
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Ilhan Omar’s $30 million disclosure exposes left’s hypocrisy
Rep. Ilhan Omar once dismissed suggestions she was a millionaire as “ridiculous.” That was only a few months ago. Now, according to her latest congressional financial disclosure, Omar and her husband report assets valued between $6 million and $30 million. That’s not just millionaire territory – it’s potentially the top one percent.
The jump is staggering. Businesses tied to Omar’s husband, including a California winery and a venture capital firm, went from reporting thousands in value one year to millions the next. Rose Lake Capital, his firm, is now valued at up to $25 million. For a couple that not long ago claimed to be weighed down by student loans, it’s an astonishing turn of fortune.
But the real story here isn’t Omar’s wealth. It’s what her success reveals about the left’s hypocrisy when it comes to capitalism. Democrats spend years railing against the system, insisting the American dream is a sham, that ordinary people are locked out of financial security and that only government can protect them. Yet when they benefit from the system themselves, suddenly the rules look pretty fair.
Omar is not the first. We’ve seen this movie before. Bernie Sanders railed against millionaires until he became one. Then the villain suddenly became “billionaires.” Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez built her brand on rejecting capitalism, all while selling “Tax the Rich” merchandise online. Liberals tell Americans the game is rigged, but their own lifestyles tell a different story: capitalism works just fine when you know how to use it.
And here’s the irony: the very financial habits the left sneers at are the same ones that built Omar’s fortune. Owning businesses. Securing investment. Growing equity. Reaping the rewards of risk. These aren’t sinister schemes – they’re the building blocks of wealth creation in a free market.
The problem is, Democrats can’t celebrate this success without shattering their narrative. If they admit capitalism rewards smart financial choices, then their argument for bigger government collapses. So instead, they downplay their wealth, deny the obvious and keep repeating the myth that ordinary Americans can’t get ahead.
But that myth is getting harder to sell. Millions of Americans already know the truth. They contribute to their 401(k)s year after year. They buy homes and watch equity rise. They start side businesses. They invest in stocks, gold, or real estate. These people aren’t greedy – they’re responsible. They’re doing the same thing Omar did, just without the Washington influence and venture capital firm.
Capitalism doesn’t guarantee wealth, but it gives people the tools to build it. And contrary to the left’s rhetoric, those tools aren’t limited to the elite. A worker who puts 20 percent of his paycheck into retirement for 30 years will retire a millionaire. A young family that buys a modest home and holds onto it through decades of appreciation will likely end up with a sizable nest egg. Millions of Americans have quietly proven this true.So why won’t Democrats admit it? Because it would undermine the culture of grievance politics they depend on. If ordinary people believe they can build wealth through discipline and wise choices, then the left’s message of dependency loses its power. Their political survival depends on convincing Americans that the deck is so stacked against them that self-reliance is futile.
That’s why Omar’s financial disclosure is more than a tabloid headline. It’s a cultural moment. Here is one of the loudest critics of capitalism, now sitting on the kind of wealth that capitalism makes possible. Her story doesn’t prove the system is rigged. It proves the system works.
None of this means Omar is corrupt for building wealth. On the contrary, her success is what we should want for more Americans. Saving, investing and entrepreneurship are positive, not shameful. But it does mean her rhetoric – and the broader leftist narrative – is hollow. You can’t attack capitalism on Monday and cash its rewards on Tuesday without looking like a hypocrite.
At some point, Democrats will have to decide: do they truly believe capitalism is irredeemable, or do they secretly recognize its power but prefer to keep voters in the dark? Omar’s sudden millionaire status suggests the latter.
The truth is, capitalism encourages something good: responsibility. It rewards those who plan ahead, take risks and steward their money wisely. That’s not exploitation – it’s empowerment. Instead of shaming capitalism, Democrats should celebrate it. They should stop pretending financial success is only possible for the privileged few, when their own lives prove otherwise.
Omar’s disclosure is a reminder that even the loudest critics of capitalism rely on it. And that, perhaps, is the ultimate hypocrisy of the modern left.